2 am
by shmulia
Summary: Whoever set off the fire alarm at 2 in the morning is on Katara's shit list. Even if he is hot and shirtless. (Zutara college au, with some Taang thrown in for good measure)


Katara was going to kill her flatmate. Slowly. Painfully. With a cactus.

Who the _hell_ managed to set the fire alarm off at 2am anyway?

It had been a long day for Katara; she had woken up at seven, been at the hospital on a nine hour shift for placement, spent another four hours writing up a report on the long-term effects of cactus juice on the body, and had been unable to get to sleep. And when she had finally, _finally_ started to drift off, the high pitched drone of the fire alarm had gone off. After spending a minute with her duvet over her head, praying for the incessant beeping to _just stop, please, I'm a good person, for the love of God just let me sleep._

When it didn't end, the brunette shoved her duvet off her body, awake enough to plan bloody murder using a plant (although why she'd thought of a cactus, she had no idea. Maybe she'd been writing about cactus juice for too long). Rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, Katara pulled open the door, revealing a girl with the worst case of bed-head Katara had ever seen. Toph's fist was in the air, poised to knock on the door which had just flown out of reach. Katara glared at the younger girl, assuming that _she_ had set off the worst noise Katara's ears had ever been subjected to (and she had heard Sokka sing) and needed the brunette's help turning it off.

"Toph," Katara practically growled over the beeping, "I swear, if you were making a midnight snack and set off this alarm, I am going to _kill_ -"

"Calm down Sugar Queen," Toph interrupted, moving her airborne hand to her hip, "I didn't set off the alarm. I just wanted to make sure you were awake in case we need to head outside."

Katara glanced up at the flashing red light in the hallway. "Like anyone could sleep through _that_ ," she said, wondering if she would be able to break the infernal device if she threw her shoe at it hard enough. She sighed. "Thanks though, Toph. If it goes on for another couple of minutes we'll leave, ok?" Toph nodded, stretching.

"Sure thing," Toph yawned, leaning against Katara's doorframe as the brunette slid a dressing gown over her pyjamas. As Katara sat on the bed to on a pair of shoes, the universe seemed to take pity on her as the fire alarm stopped. Katara fell backwards onto the mattress, closing her eyes in relief.

"Thank _God_ ," she sighed, revelling in the peace that the silence brought. She could practically feel Toph rolling her eyes at her dramatics, but didn't care; she was ready to sleep.

"Right, clearly someone needs her beauty sleep. Night, Sugar Queen!" Toph said. Katara responded with what was supposedto be a "goodnight", but came out as mumble. She heard Toph shut the door softly, and rolled onto her front, not caring that she was still in her dressing gown. Katara dragged herself up the bed so her feet weren't dangling off the end, and began to pull the cover over her when she heard it.

Someone was knocking on the front door. Katara's cactus plan shot back into her mind.

"I killed someone in a past life. That's the only explanation. I'm suffering for my sins," Katara muttered, swinging herself out of bed for the second time in five minutes. She walked to the front door, too tired to be anything but angry, and pulled it open.

" _What?_ " she snapped groggily, looking up at the person opposite her, who seemed rather alarmed by the abrupt greeting. And then she stopped breathing.

He was _gorgeous_. And, for some reason, shirtless.

Maybe she hadn't been _that_ bad in a past life, Katara thought as she took in the man in front of her, because God was clearly apologising for the fire alarm. That, or she was hallucinating. Really, how often did an attractive, tall, muscular, _shirtless_ guy turn up on your doorstep?

Not often enough, Katara thought to herself.

The two stared at each other, Katara waiting for the shirtless guy to speak.

"Hello, Zuko here. Um. Hi. I live next door. I don't know if you heard the fire alarm go off just now-" he started, before Katara cut him off.

"Oh, I heard it alright," Katara said, narrowing her eyes. If Zuko revealed that he was the cause of the alarm, hotness be damned, his death would be swift but painful.

Zuko gulped nervously.

"Ah, okay. My flatmate is kind of responsible for that, and sent me over to apologise. So. Yeah. Sorry about that."

Katara growled, folding her arms over her chest. "And _he_ didn't come over to apologise because...?"

Zuko raised his hands defensively. "He's just clearing the air in our apartment. He said he'll come out in a second, but wanted someone to apologise immediately, and shoved me out of the door before I could even put on a shirt!"

Katara's eyes flicked to Zuko's chest before meeting his eyes again, unable to stop herself. Zuko noticed the small grin growing on Katara's face, and his cheeks reddened.

Zuko cleared his throat in a desperate attempt to distract them both from his state of undress. "Anyway... Sorry about the fire alarm," he said.

Katara repressed a yawn, and nodded at Zuko. "It's fine," she said, rubbing her eyes as exhaustion washed over her, removing her anger and replacing it with the desire to sleep. "Just try not to do it again, okay?"

"Sure, no prob-" Zuko's reply was cut short by the opening of his apartment door. The boy who emerged from the slightly smoky doorway bounded across the hallway, stopping next to Zuko with surprising grace. He was a year or so younger than Zuko, if Katara's guess was right, and appeared to be incredibly awake considering the time.

"Hi! You must be Katara! We're your neighbours!" the shorter boy said, gesturing to Zuko and himself. He was almost scarily perky, and Katara wasn't quite sure how to deal with someone that energetic at two in the morning. "I'm Aang! I'm really sorry about the fire alarm!" he continued, a ball of energy that Katara wasn't currently capable of handling.

"Er, hi," she said, wondering if this was all a strange dream. She frowned slightly as a thought occurred to her. "How do you know my name?"

"We know Toph," Aang replied.

Katara blinked in surprise.

"Oh. Okay. Fair enough. How exactly do you know her?" Katara asked, racking her brains to remember if Toph had ever mentioned the two boys standing opposite her (and if she hadn't, why the hell not?)

"We're in the same ceramics class," Aang said, and a glimmer of remembrance filtered through the fog of Katara's memory of Toph mentioning the dorky boy in her sculpting class who was just _ridiculously_ sweet and enthusiastic. Katara could see where Toph was coming from.

"Speak of the devil," Zuko murmured, nudging Aang whilst nodding towards Katara. The brunette turned to see her flatmate sauntering towards them, grinning.

"Did I hear that right Twinkletoes? _You_ set off the fire alarm?"

Aang grinned, his hand shooting to rub the back of his head endearingly. "Basically, I was cooking a late night snack because I missed dinner – Professor Gyatsu's lecture went on for _ever_ – and as I was cooking, I realised I hadn't done my fifteen minutes of daily meditation. So I thought, hey, the food will take fifteen minutes, so I'll do it now! But I guess I meditated too long, because the next thing I knew the alarm was going off, and Zuko was running out of his room and swearing a lot. Zuko's weirdly good with fire though, and managed to put it out!"

"Aang, I used a _fire extinguisher_. It's not exactly like I can control the damn element..."

"Not the point! Anyway, Sifu Hotman here put it out, and we realised it probably disturbed you, so we just wanted to come and apologise."

"Sorry it took so long to turn the alarm off," Zuko said, pushing his hair out of his eyes. "There was a lot of smoke, and we had to fan the air out of the window to try and clear it."

Toph snorted. "Only you could set off a fire alarm by _meditating_ , Twinkletoes."

"I feel like that's a compliment," Aang said, blushing slightly as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his orange hoodie.

"That's a weird thing to take as a compliment, Aang," Zuko said, raising an eyebrow at his flatmate.

"Shut up, Zuko."

Katara watched the conversation with bemusement, leaning against the doorframe to stay upright. As interesting as watching Aang potentially try to flirt with Toph was, tiredness was overwhelming Katara. She feebly attempted to suppress a yawn, but couldn't quite prevent a sigh coming out. She pressed her head against the doorframe, blinking rapidly to try and stay awake. She didn't realise that Zuko was watching her until his voice pulled her away from trying to figure out if Toph had a bit of a crush on their neighbour.

"Aang, we should head back. You've got a 9am tomor- today. And we may not be the only ones with an early start," The taller boy said, nudging Aang with his elbow. Aang's face immediately became contrite as he followed Zuko's gaze to Katara, whose dependency on the doorframe was becoming more obvious by the second.

"Good point. Sorry for keeping you two awake!" Aang said earnestly. "Is there any way we can make it up to you?"

Katara was about to say "let me go to bed" as her request, but Toph got there first.

"Dinner."

Katara straightened up immediately, looking at Toph in surprise. A blush formed on both boys' faces, and Aang's face split into a grin.

"Wait, what?" Zuko asked, confusion emanating from him. "Dinner? Like, a date?"

Toph crossed her arms, smiling slyly. "Call it what you will, you owe us dinner. I love a free meal, and Katara could use a night out."

"Hey!"

"Am I wrong, Sugar Queen?"

"...No."

"Exactly. So, you guys game?" Toph asked.

Zuko's eyes met Katara's, and his cheeks reddened even further. "Dinner... would be nice," he said, breaking eye contact with the brunette. Aang nodded enthusiastically, his grin unwavering.

"Awesome. We'll figure out the details tomorrow. I think Katara's gonna pass out if she doesn't get in bed asap." Toph said, pulling her flatmate out of the doorway and into the apartment hall. "See you guys round!"

She shut the door as the boys began to say goodbye, and Katara noticed that Zuko wasn't the only one with flaming cheeks.

"So... you and Aang, huh?" she asked, smirking slightly at the usually unflustered girl.

"Goodnight, Sugar Queen," Toph said, waving as she turned her back on Katara, walking towards her room. "Oh, and you owe me one!"

"For what?" Katara asked, confused.

Toph turned and winked at Katara.

"You and Zuko are going to get on reeeeeally well," the younger girl said, before shutting her door. Katara shook her head, and went into her room to curl into her one true love, her bed.

As she tucked the duvet around herself, Katara smiled slightly as she felt blissful unconsciousness calling her.

Maybe fire alarms should go off more often, she thought. At least, ones that result in shirtless Zuko at her door...


End file.
